Europe

Martin Rohland is leaving Landesbank Baden-Württemberg to join Barclays Capital’s covered bond syndicate team, The Cover understands.

Standard & Poor’s placed three Greek covered bond issuers and one Greek bank that is setting up a covered bond programme on negative review on Friday, following its placement of the Greek sovereign on CreditWatch negative the day before.

France’s Caisse de Refinancement de l’Habitat yesterday (Thursday) sold a Eu300m increase of a Eu1.8bn 2020 transaction that was was driven by reverse enquiry and benefitted from a back-up in yields that syndicate officials said was conducive to long dated supply.

Standard & Poor’s today (Friday) placed five Portuguese covered bond issuers on negative review after it on Tuesday took the same rating action on the Portuguese sovereign [amended].

In brief: Fitch will no longer rate mortgage and public sector Pfandbriefe issued by Deutsche Genossenschafts-Hypothekenbank AG, according to a statement released yesterday (Monday). The bank’s covered bonds will therefore only be rated by Standard & Poor’s.

Pfandbriefe could stand to benefit from the introduction of a new resolution regime for German banks, according to market participants, given that the new regime provides for the possibility of a bail-in of senior unsecured creditors but upholds protections for Pfandbriefe set out in the country’s Pfandbrief law.

Standard & Poor’s on Friday cut mortgage backed covered bonds issued by Ireland’s AIB Mortgage Bank and Bank of Ireland Mortgage Bank from AA+ to AA and from AAA to AA+, respectively, after downgrading their parents’ issuer ratings on the same day.

Traditional end-of-year auctions held by Denmark’s mortgage lenders kicked off yesterday (Thursday), with around Dkr537bn (Eu72bn) of interest-reset mortgage bonds lined up for refinancing. Surplus liquidity is expected to contribute to the large volumes being well absorbed despite difficult wider market conditions.

Rough market conditions and dwindling liquidity mean that few to no deals could be launched next week although some issuers are still monitoring the market, according to syndicate bankers.

Finland’s Sampo Housing Loan Bank took advantage of calmer market conditions yesterday (Thursday) to price its first benchmark covered bond in four years, and an official at the issuer told The Cover that strong investor feedback had given it the confidence to come to a market that may now be closed for new supply until 2011.

Moody’s today (Thursday) indicated that the long term debt ratings of Bank of Ireland, EBS Building Society and Irish Life & Permanent could end up lower than the rating agency envisaged when it placed them on review for possible downgrade on October 6.

Finland’s Sampo Housing Loan Bank launched a Eu1bn five year benchmark on Thursday, its first covered bond since being acquired by Danske Bank in 2006 and the third Finnish euro issue to hit the market this month. Meanwhile Germany’s DVB Bank has sold its first publicly placed ship Pfandbrief and Dexia Municipal Agency is preparing to meet Australian investors.